Exporting/extracting photos

[Michael Rooz]

Word 2001
Mac Classic

I'm working on an ad that needs to be designed in a page layout program but
the base files the client has given me are Word doc files. I need to extract
the photos from these files but I see no clear way of doing this. What is
the best method for doing this? Thanks much.

Michael

 

[Elliott Roper]

Word 2001
Mac Classic

I'm working on an ad that needs to be designed in a page layout program but
the base files the client has given me are Word doc files. I need to extract
the photos from these files but I see no clear way of doing this. What is
the best method for doing this? Thanks much.

Michael

By far the best method is to go back to the client for the original
artwork in a form suited to your layout program. Word has almost
certainly screwed the art up beyond re-usability.

e.g to make sure that I was correct, In Word, I inserted from file a
jpg that started out at 150dpi and was 1045*859 pixels and occupied
519KB on disk.

After saving and re-opening the Word doc, I selected the picture and
copied it to the clipboard. From there I created a new file with
GraphicConverter. It now claims it is 300 dpi and 1700*1400 pixels and
it looks dreadful. Aside from taking small liberties with the aspect
ratio, what were once smooth enough diagonal lines have become jagged
staircases and most of the fine detail is lost. In the process Word has
expanded the file to 2.5MB and tripled its memory footprint as well.

The result is unusable except at about 1/10 its original size.
OK this was in Word v.X which was no improment over 5.1 in Classic when
it comes to placing art, that's for sure.

You could try the GraphicConverter trick yourself, but don't blame GC
for the result. It is probably the best piece of shareware ever for the
Mac http://www.lemkesoft.de Every Mac user should have a copy.

 

[JE McGimpsey]

By far the best method is to go back to the client for the original
artwork in a form suited to your layout program. Word has almost
certainly screwed the art up beyond re-usability.

e.g to make sure that I was correct, In Word, I inserted from file a
jpg that started out at 150dpi and was 1045*859 pixels and occupied
519KB on disk.

Hmm...

I just inserted a jpg (from file) in a Word doc in Word04. Saved it.
Opened it in Word01, saved it as a web page, and the file created in the
_files folder seems identical to the original (I'm not a graphic artist,
but the size, compression, resolution and histograms in GC looked the
same to me).

Saving as web page in Word 2004, I get a much larger file. The original
had a compression of 1:41, the _files version had a 1:5 compression.
Otherwise they looked *nearly* identical (the _files version actually
looked just a bit better, but the original was slightly overexposed).

So perhaps, at least in in Word01, grabbing the pictures generated while
saving as web page is adequate.

 

[Elliott Roper]

Hmm...

I just inserted a jpg (from file) in a Word doc in Word04. Saved it.
Opened it in Word01, saved it as a web page, and the file created in the
_files folder seems identical to the original (I'm not a graphic artist,
but the size, compression, resolution and histograms in GC looked the
same to me).

Saving as web page in Word 2004, I get a much larger file. The original
had a compression of 1:41, the _files version had a 1:5 compression.
Otherwise they looked *nearly* identical (the _files version actually
looked just a bit better, but the original was slightly overexposed).

So perhaps, at least in in Word01, grabbing the pictures generated while
saving as web page is adequate.

I could easily believe we are both right. How big was your picture?
I suspect Word mangles pictures when it thinks they are too big for the
page. Also, I could easily be convinced that Word v.X makes a bigger
mess of it than 2001.

Michael might as well try copy and paste via GC. If it works for him,
it will save an embarrassing moment with his client.

 

[JE McGimpsey]

I could easily believe we are both right. How big was your picture?
I suspect Word mangles pictures when it thinks they are too big for the
page. Also, I could easily be convinced that Word v.X makes a bigger
mess of it than 2001.

The original was about 288KB. The file generated in the _files folder
was exactly the same. The file generated by Word04 was 2MB.

 

[John McGhie]

Hi Elliott:

The way it's "supposed" to work is that if you insert a picture in Word,
Word will alter its displayed size to fit the available margins. The
original picture should remain untouched within the document: Word simply
scales for printing or display.

If you then copy said object and paste it into a graphics program using
Paste/Special, you should be able to select the original format, which
should return you the original untouched object, except that for some
formats it will have been decompressed.

Very few programs seem to be able to get hold of size parameters from Word,
so you may indeed see some funny aspect ratios.

Here, that seems to be what is happening: I get the picture out of the
document with its original pixels intact, although the resolution has been
set to 300 dpi.

Cheers

I could easily believe we are both right. How big was your picture?
I suspect Word mangles pictures when it thinks they are too big for the
page. Also, I could easily be convinced that Word v.X makes a bigger
mess of it than 2001.

Michael might as well try copy and paste via GC. If it works for him,
it will save an embarrassing moment with his client.

--

Please reply to the newsgroup to maintain the thread. Please do not email
me unless I ask you to.

John McGhie <[email protected]>
Consultant Technical Writer
Sydney, Australia +61 4 1209 1410

 

[Elliott Roper]

Hi Elliott:

The way it's "supposed" to work is that if you insert a picture in Word,
Word will alter its displayed size to fit the available margins. The
original picture should remain untouched within the document: Word simply
scales for printing or display.

Ah! I owe Word an apology.

If you then copy said object and paste it into a graphics program using
Paste/Special, you should be able to select the original format, which
should return you the original untouched object, except that for some
formats it will have been decompressed.

Very few programs seem to be able to get hold of size parameters from Word,
so you may indeed see some funny aspect ratios.

GraphicConverter, possibly with a little help from Word does indeed
manage to end up with the "New from clipboard..." having some bizarre
dimensions and colour depths. If I set them the same as the original
picture that went in, then the result is acceptable.
At first paste a 1045*849 pixel jpg in millions wanted to be 1400*700
256 colours. (At least that's what GC claimed Word claimed for the
original picture. So either Word was lying or GC had wax in its ears.

A second attempt on the same clipboard had it right. It would therefore
seem that GC might be using a previous picture's parameters and
ignoring whatever Word is telling it. If so, it is not consistent. A
second attempt with another picture worked properly.

Another file after a trip through Word pasted itself into Photoshop
with the original dimensions. Looks like I should raise this with
Thorsten Lemke. I will try to get a consistent demo of the problem for
him.

Here, that seems to be what is happening: I get the picture out of the
document with its original pixels intact, although the resolution has been
set to 300 dpi.

Same here. (after correcting the size shape and depth)

So my advice should have been. "Get the original artwork parameters,
such as depth and dimensions in pixels" then copy from Word and paste
special into GraphicConverter after first correcting dimensions and
colour depth settings to be the same as the original art."


Personally I'm sticking to my working practice of never trusting art
that has been inside Word.
Even though I might have been a little harsh.